


even in the dust we shine

by findyourstars



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-27
Updated: 2016-05-25
Packaged: 2018-04-28 07:56:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5084023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/findyourstars/pseuds/findyourstars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>the "we keep running into each other in the waiting room of the counseling office and we strike up an awkward friendship " AU</p><p>or</p><p>the story about how two lost and broken people help each other begin to heal</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was an interesting story for me to write, but it honestly wouldn't leave me alone.
> 
> I'm mentally ill and I really hate it when people use anxiety or depression or self harm or PTSD as token "shock pieces" in their fanfics. Mental illness is more than lying on your couch while your photogenic girlfriend cuddles you and brings you tea. It's doubt and loneliness and losing friendships and feeling all the time like you're a total waste of space.
> 
> But things can get a little easier when you let others in, if it's done the right way. So this fic happened.
> 
> I will not be including graphic descriptions of any sort; this fic is not to glorify mental illness. It's to show how two people can support each other through the lows and dark times and both come out stronger on the other side. That being said, I will include trigger warnings where they are applicable!

The waiting area is small and has too many chairs - and today, too many people. You’re wedged in the back corner by the magazines, where you like to be so you can watch the room, but there are at least four other people in here and that’s _way_ too many. It doesn’t help that you’re all looking at each other with awkward side-eyes, like you’re a bunch of bombs primed to go off.

You kind of want to yell something just to see them all jump. 

It would break the fucking silence, anyways.

You look a little gayer than usual today, with your combat boots and sleeveless denim shirt, and it gives you enough of a confidence boost that you can rifle through the magazines at your left until you find an issue of _Out_. You prop it proudly open on your knee and stare around the room, looking for a challenge, but no one is looking at you.

You huff and try to focus on the pages, now jumping up and down in your lap as your knee jiggles beneath them. Ellen Page and Julianne Moore are going to be in a movie together, the article in front of you proclaims. Maybe this magazine is older than you thought — that’s last month’s news. 

Bored again, you lean back with a huff and entertain yourself by watching the others in the room and trying to guess what they’re in for. The sullen-looking jock in the corner is likely doing required sessions for getting an alcohol citation, same with the redhead two seats down from him. You can’t get a good read on the others.

A girl sweeps around the corner and stops in the entrance to the waiting area, breathing a little hard from the four flights of stairs that lead to the counseling center. She’s blonde and her hair is hanging in loose waves that soften her face, though you can still see a stubborn chin and a hard set to her eyes. Then her gaze meets yours, and the two of you lock eyes just long enough for you to see that they’re blue before you look away in discomfort. 

“Mind if I sit here?”

You look up again and she’s closer now, hovering a pace in front of you with one hand clutching the strap of her backpack. You shrug noncommittally, but the anxiety in your stomach surges. You don’t want to talk to people here, it’s uncomfortable and awkward and if you’re here there’s something wrong with you, right? 

“Thanks.”

She slides into the seat next to you, and you shove your magazine back into the basket. Thankfully it doesn’t seem like she wants to talk; she pulls out her phone and scrolls absently through what looks like her Facebook feed. You can feel the heat of her next to you though, and you can see in your periphery the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes. 

Her left wrist is in a light blue cast, one of those hard ones that people have drawn on. If you weren’t sitting in the waiting room of your university’s counseling center, you would ask her what happened, just for the sake of making conversation with a cute girl. And she is cute; you’re refusing to look at her straight on, but what you can see from the corner of your eye is very aesthetically pleasing.

“Lexa?”

The receptionist calls your name, and you can see Dr. Olson emerging from her office down the hall. You grab your bag and sling it over your shoulder, then chance a glance back at the blonde girl. She meets your eyes and smiles, small and soft.

Later you can’t remember if you smiled back or not.

\\\

You see her again the next Tuesday, same time, same place. Only this week you’re in a miserable mood and it’s only because of Anya that you could even get your ass out of bed to go to therapy. You know Olson’s probably going to bitch at you or something for missing your classes, and you’re not looking forward to it, so you don’t notice at first when she enters the waiting room.

You do notice when she takes a seat - across the room this time - because some person’s phone is chiming with “new text message” noises and you look up to tell them to shut it off but your words die on your tongue when you look up and see the blonde again, because her hair is a wind-wispy halo and her eyes are so, so blue, and you swallow and look down at your shoes. Your socks aren’t matching, but honestly it’s a victory that you even got out the door this morning. 

“I like your socks.”

You glance up, startled, deer-in-headlights, but it’s the blonde, and she has that tiny smile on her lips again. You actually do try to smile back this time, but you’re exhausted and it’s hard.

“Thanks.”

She’s watching you when you look back up at her again, like she’s waiting for you to say something, but then Olson pokes her head around the corner and waves you back towards her office, and your brain shifts gears so quickly you don’t think about the blonde again until later than evening when you’re curled up beneath your covers and trying to sleep.

You think you dream about her eyes, or something equally corny, because the next morning you wake up thinking of her and actually feeling good enough to get your lazy ass to your morning statistics course.

\\\

The next Tuesday you’re running late and don’t make it up to the counseling office until five minutes past the hour, so Olson is already waiting for you and you don’t get to check the waiting room for the blonde.

The forty minutes pass as they always do, and you leave Olson’s blue-checked couch behind. Normally you don’t go by the receptionist’s desk — you’re here at the same time every week, and you have a standing appointment - but for some reason today you feel like going to double-check things.

The receptionist gives you a funny look and says yes, your name is still in the calendar, and you thank her and turn to go - and then collide with the blonde.

She gives a little startled “oh!” and drops all the papers in her hands like she’s something out of a romantic comedy, and you’re actually rolling your eyes at yourself as you bend down to help her pick them up. You want to laugh out loud when your fingers brush, and you’re grinning when you look up and meet the girl’s eyes.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” she teases, her voice pleasantly husky, and a little thrill rolls down your back. And because you’re awkward as fuck and have no response to that, you just shrug and hand her the last of her papers.

(Not before, of course, you glance at the header. It’s a depression questionnaire, one that you’ve filled out at least four different times in your life, and you feel a tug of empathy towards this blue-eyed girl with the cast on her wrist.)

“I’m Clarke,” she says, and then offers her hand to help you to your feet. You take it, feeling a bit like a damsel in distress, and tuck a piece of hair behind your ear.

“Lexa,” you reply, and she smiles.

“Lexa,” she repeats, and you love the way her tongue touches the back of her teeth at the L and curls around the vowels. It’s enough to make you feel immediately self-conscious, but before you can do anything unbearably awkward Clarke tilts her head towards the door.

“Are you heading out?”

“Yeah.”

\\\

Clarke is sweet. She’s chatty in a light, nervous kind of way, but you appreciate all the same that she seems willing to fill the silence, because what would you say? Your only common ground right now is a therapist’s office, and you don’t really watch a lot of movies but you’re pretty sure that’s not how the romantic comedies tend to start.

(You’re not sure why you keep casting the two of you opposite each other in a romantic comedy; you really need to get a rein on that thought before it spirals into something embarrassing.)

You find out she’s a year younger than you - a sophomore, majoring in biology (but she’s not sure if she wants to go to med school), and she seems interested when you tell her you’re studying ecology and minoring in business.

“What do you want to do with that?” She asks, and normally hearing that question would make you want to kick her teeth in, but from Clarke it just elicits a feeling of calm resignation.

“Public policy,” you say, giving her the canned answer, but for some reason you want to keep talking. “Or maybe I’ll just drop the whole business side of it and just go live in the woods.”

She likes that, and you smile when her lips part in laughter. You think you rather like that sound.

\---\\\\---

You think you rather like Lexa.

She’s quiet and a little closed-off, and she’s really intimidating, but there’s something sparkling behind all those walls like a bit of quartz half-buried in the dirt. Which, duh, you ran into her at the therapist’s, it’s understandable that she has some baggage.

(You wonder what she thinks your issue is. You don’t think there’s any way she can suss it out, but there’s something about her eyes, quick and sharp, that makes you feel insecure.)

Seeing her on Tuesdays becomes a pattern for you, and it’s something that you actually look forward to, which is a bit of a rarity these days. You talk a good game, all chirpy and bright, but that facade is exhausting. So it’s nice to be with Lexa — someone who has no idea what’s going on in your life, and therefore someone that you don’t have to pretend with.

You don’t spill out your darkest secrets or anything, but you can comfortably admit to her that you’re stressed about a paper coming up for such-and-such class or that you _really_ wish Octavia would let you get dinner alone for once in your life.

“It’s like she thinks I’m a depressed loner if I end up eating by myself,” you grump to Lexa, who flicks you the quarter-smile that means she’s listening, but there’s something a little off about it. You mentally page through your last sentence and immediately wince.

“Shit, I’m sorry, that was insensitive.” And then — oh shit, what if Lexa isn’t depressed and you just made a _giant_ assumption that’s about to bite you in the ass? “I mean — sorry, I didn’t mean to assume you were…or weren’t—”

“It’s okay.” Lexa interrupts you for the first time in your short relationship (is it quite a friendship yet?), and that surprises you enough that you shut up. “We met in the counseling office, it’s not that big of an assumption to make.” That quarter-smile again, but this time her eyes are brighter, and something tells you that she’s teasing a little bit. You let out a sigh.

“Right. Sorry.” 

The first leaves of fall crunch beneath your feet as the two of you fall silent again and continue on towards the dining hall, where your paths usually split and you head off to the library. You’re not sure where Lexa goes.

“What?” Lexa had said something to you, and you weren’t paying attention.

“I just asked what happened to your arm? It’s been in a cast for like a month now.” Her words are a little tight, a little forced, like she isn’t used to initiating conversations. (She probably isn’t - you talk enough for both of you.) And a heady feeling rushes through you, like you’re standing on the edge of a cliff and looking down at the dizzying drop that’s only a breath away. This is the moment, you think. You could tell her everything. But you’re starting to shake a little bit, and you exhale a long breath to try and slow your heart rate.

“I was in a car accident,” you answer, but it’s short and a little rude, and you see Lexa’s eyes widen the tiniest bit in surprise. But, to her credit, she doesn’t say anything.

All too soon you reach the intersection where you go right and she goes left, and the two of you stop. You feel bad for cutting her off, for slamming the metaphorical door in her face, and you want to articulate that somehow to her — that it’s nothing personal, but she just surprised you and you need to be the one to bring it up or else you freak out a bit — so you clear your throat to get her attention.

“Would you maybe…want to get coffee sometime?” You look towards the library. There’s a cafe in the basement where you like to study sometimes, and Lexa follows your gaze before her eyes flick back to yours.

For a brief moment all you can think about is how beautifully _green_ they are, but then she’s smiling again. It’s larger than usual, maybe a half-smile, and that little victory makes you smile back. “I would like that,” she says.

“Great. Um, next week, after…after?”

She tips her head to the side thoughtfully. “What about Thursday afternoon, the same time?”

“That’s perfect.”

And just like that, you actually have a second event to look forward to this week. 

—

 **Anya (12:15pm):** You going to come running with me tomorrow?  
**Lexa (12:45pm):** Can’t, sorry.  
**Anya (12:46pm):** C’mon Lex.  
**Anya (12:46pm):** Exercise is a very healthy stress reliever, and it gets your endorphins going!  
**Anya (1:00pm):** Lexa.  
**Anya (1:15pm):** You can’t just ignore me when I say things you don't like.  
**Lexa (1:35pm):** jesus christ, I was in class  
**Lexa (1:36pm):** Not that it’s any of your business, but I actually have plans tmrw afternoon.  
**Anya (1:40pm):** What kind of plans?  
**Anya (1:40pm):** Rewatching Dexter doesn’t count.  
**Lexa (1:46pm):** I’m getting coffee with someone.  
**Anya (1:48pm):** Oh really? Anyone I know?  
**Lexa (1:50pm):** Don’t think so.

—

You’re checking your phone compulsively for what has to be the fifth time in two minutes when Lexa slides into the seat across from you, and you almost toss your phone across the room when you jump.

“Sorry,” she blurts out. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

She’s wearing a denim jacket that’s a little too long for her arms, and she tucks her hands deeper into the sleeves and fidgets as you try to ease her with a smile.

“It’s okay, I startle easily. My roommates think it’s hilarious,” you admit, and you think you see her shoulders relax a little bit.

“How many roommates do you have?”

“Two, but our other friends are over often enough that sometimes it feels like more.” You roll your eyes. “This is the second year that I’ve lived with Raven and Octavia, and I love them, but sometimes they’re a bit much.”

“So you’re off-campus, then?”

“Vine Street.” It’s scarcely two blocks from campus, which is nice because that means your streets are likely going to get plowed once the snow starts. “What about you?”

“I’m in the new dorms,” Lexa says. It’s a little odd for an upperclassman to still be on campus, but you don’t comment.

You go to order coffee instead, and Lexa shoots you a look that says “don’t you dare” when you try to pull out your wallet to pay for both of you.

“I have a gift card,” you insist, and she backs down, but you notice that she opts for the cheapest thing on the menu (besides tap water).

“Thanks,” she says when the two of you are seated again. She has shrugged the sleeves of her jacket up to elbows and wraps her fingers around the cardboard take-out cup of tea. You have opted for your usual - a grande soy caramel machiatto with no whip - but it’s still far too hot to drink.

You make small talk for a moment or two longer, but when the first pause in the conversation comes you give into the question that’s been tingling on the back of your tongue for weeks now.

“So…how long have you been going to the counseling center?”

Lexa’s eyes tighten, and she starts to wriggle her hands back into her sleeves again, and you wish with everything in your body that you had not been so insensitive, again. 

“I’m sorry, you just seem really — well-adjusted?” You try, and you blink as Lexa immediately coughs out a laugh. 

“You clearly don’t know me very well, Clarke,” she says. Her tone sounds closer to gallows humor than levity, but you’ll take it.

You shrug. “I don’t know, you’re nice and really pretty and you got coffee with me, and you haven’t serial-murdered me yet, so I’ll consider that well-adjusted.”

(You think she blushes a little bit when you call her pretty, and you do a little mental fist-pump.)

“Well, how long have _you_ been going to the counseling?”

You frown when she turns the question back on you. Not fair, but you were asking for it, you guess. “I just started this semester. They seem nice enough, I guess.”

Lexa shrugs. “I guess. They’re okay if you get someone good.” A smile tugs at her lips for a shadow of a second. “The first time I went I got a grad student who started crying.”

Your eyes flip wide. “She started _crying_?”

Lexa’s smile grows, and she leans back. You feel the sole of her boot tap against the rungs of your chair as she settles herself. “It was ridiculous. It’s like, aren’t I supposed to be the one crying?”

“I hope you switched therapists after that,” you huff.

“Of course.” Lexa stops for a moment and chews on her lip. “I’ve been seeing Dr. Olson for two years now, and she’s not bad.”

“I have…Marie somebody?”

“She’s a grad student?” You nod. “Yeah, she’s one of the good ones.”

“Yeah, I like her.” Your eyes drop to your coffee, and you lace your fingers tightly in your lap. “Mine is because of the car accident.”

It’s easy to say it like that - the half-truth is tame on its own, and you don’t mind her assuming that you’re in therapy because you’re too stressed out to drive now or something. It’s better than giving the specifics, in which you’d probably freak her out and scare her away. You feel like you’re hiding this dark secret, like oil creeping invisibly beneath your fair skin, and you dodge Lexa’s gaze because you all of a sudden feel dirty and Wrong and Crazy, even though all you said was that you were in a car crash. Lexa makes you feel like she can see right through you with those sharp eyes.

But Lexa is quiet, and when you meet her eyes again, they are moss-green and gentle. “I’m sorry,” she says, and it’s so careful and genuine that somehow in that moment, you know that she knows you’re hiding, and she’s okay with it.

She is silent for a couple of heartbeats, and you hear her shift in her chair. “I’m…really bad at dealing with stress,” she says, and the words are slow and heavy. Trading secrets for secrets.

How do you respond to this? Having other people splash pity on you like holy water is one of the most awkward and uncomfortable feelings in the entire world. So you tilt your head a little bit, holding your eye contact with Lexa, and ask quietly, “Are you stressed right now?”

Something in her seems to lighten at that, and her fingers loosen around her coffee. “Not in the slightest,” she says, and her smile mirrors yours.

\\\

There are some days when you feel like a normal human being. You get up and go to class and can pay attention and you take notes like a boss and ace every assignment that crosses your desk. You go to the gym in the evenings and then come home to fight for counter space in the kitchen with Raven and Octavia to cook your pasta. The three of you eat dinner together, sometimes with Octavia’s brother or boyfriend, and then you retire to your room to catch up on your readings and watch some Scrubs before bed.

Sometimes these days are the norm. And Raven and Octavia start looking at you with new eyes, like maybe you’re fixed for good, and you feel like you’re on top of the fucking world.

But there is always a low to follow those highs.

There has literally been nothing weird or different about today — class and an astronomy club meeting, and even the weather is nice — but you come back to your apartment with shaking hands and thoughts racing around your brain like little loud and angry remote-controlled cars. The sound of Raven cooking in the kitchen is usually soothing, but tonight every clank of the pan drives into you like a needle, and you sit at your desk and bury your face in your hands and bite into your palm because if you don’t you’re going to scream at her and she won’t know why.

Raven finishes cooking and you hear her disappear back to her room, and you finally venture out to make your own dinner. But there are dishes everywhere, and it looks like Raven literally just came home from class and dumped her shit all over the floor, and you clench your fists against your side and try to breathe because the world is all of a sudden too _much_ and it makes you want to get the hell out of your apartment and just run, run until your muscles are tired and you don’t feel like a live wire.

“Hey, Clarke! I didn’t hear you come home.”

You _jump_ when Raven comes out of her room behind you, and you’re all of a sudden breathing more quickly and you can feel how wide your eyes are. Raven stops a few feet away and backs up, like she’s facing some sort of wild animal, and she holds a hand up placatingly.

“Sorry, are you okay?”

“Fine,” you snap out, even though you’re shaking now and you feel like your heart is going to explode, and what the fuck, why is this happening _now?_ and Raven comes over and tries to put her hands on your shoulders to calm you down, but her touch is like fire and you shove her away and retain just enough presence of mind to grab your keys and phone before slamming out of your apartment.

It feels good to slam the door behind you, and you speed-walk down the hallway until you’re outside, and once the cooling air has hit your skin you just _run_ , run like something is chasing you and sprinting up the street towards campus until your breath is coming hard in your chest in a more natural way and the smack of the pavement against your feet is solid and comforting.

You’re not a runner (you hate running, actually) so you don’t last long, but by the time you slow down and let your chest heave as you gasp for air, you’re on the very edge of campus. You still feel shaky and a little irritable, but you no longer feel as out of control as you did in your apartment, surrounded by dirty dishes and engineering textbooks and Raven, and your heart is obediently slowing back to a more normal rate.

You’re still breathing hard so you walk towards the center of campus, touching your fingertips to the cold iron of the streetlights and tilting your head up to look at scattering of stars that you can just barely see under the city’s light pollution.

“Clarke?”

You do not jump this time, but you tear your gaze from the stars to see Lexa outside the nearest building: something in the business school, you think. Lexa’s hair is up in a messy bun and she has a checkered flannel wrapped around her waist, one foot propped up against the brick behind her and hands tucked behind her back. 

“Lexa!” The stars are spinning in your head, and your hands are still shaking but you feel calmer now, like some sort of blanket has been laid across your brain and is muffling the noise.

Lexa leans away from the building as you come closer and offers you a little smile. “What are you up to?”

“Just taking a walk,” you say, and your voice is higher-pitched and breathier than normal, and a narrowing in Lexa’s eyes makes you think that she realizes it.

“Are you okay?”

What a loaded question. It almost makes you laugh, as filled with nervous energy as you are in this moment, but instead you kind of smile and shrug your shoulders a little bit.

“A little anxious. I needed to move or get some fresh air or something.”

Lexa nods encouragingly. “Mind if I join you on your walk?”

“Not at all.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "therapist started crying in the middle of my session" has definitely happened to me and it was the most uncomfortable moment ever.
> 
> Drop me a hello/questions/prompts/whatever on Tumblr @ clarkesmech!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the lovely comments on the last chapter! I'm glad that so many of you are enjoying this story and that it's resonating with you. I'd also like to apologize for the wait -- I've been doing some Secret Santa fic exchanges, so those have been eating up my time for a little while.
> 
> Additionally, thank you so much to Heather for being my #1 beta reader :) You can find her on tumblr @ hollsteinstrash.
> 
> There are mentions of self-harm in this chapter, but nothing graphic.

It’s early October so it’s starting to get cold outside, and after you and Clarke walk for a few minutes you end up taking your flannel from around your waist and sliding it over your arms. You look over at Clarke, who’s looking up at the stars — she looks like she’s shivering a little bit, and you immediately regret not offering her your shirt, but now that it’s on your body it’s awkward and you can’t really do anything, so you just follow her gaze up to the sky.

“Do you know any constellations?” Clarke asks, when she sees you looking up too. You shake your head and look down just in time to keep from running into a lamppost.

“No. I appreciate the moon, though.”

“My dad tried to teach me constellations once, but all I wanted to do was look for shooting stars. He kept saying that since I was an artist I should get used to looking for pictures where there weren’t any, but I think I was too young or something.” Clarke’s voice is still high and breathy, and you can see her shaking in a way that looks too constant for being from the cold. Talking seems to be helping her wind down though, so you try to keep the conversation going.

“I grew up in the city, so I didn’t really ever get to see the stars. This is the most I’ve ever been able to see,” you admit.

Clarke looks at you, aghast. “This? These are shitty,” she says, gesturing at the streetlights lining your path. “Too much light pollution.”

You shrug. “So I’ve been told.”

“We’ll have to go camping or something sometime and look at the stars,” Clarke says breezily, and the casual invitation makes you blink. You’ve known each other how long, a few weeks?

Clarke has started talking again, and when you tune back in you find her talking about her dad again, and some camping trip he took her on after she had gotten into a fight with her mom. “It was his way of saying he was on my side, I guess.”

“What does your dad do?”

You hear Clarke’s breath catch, and you look over to see her cross her arms tightly across her chest. Her shoulders are trembling and you slide your extra shirt from your arms and hand it to her without thinking. She unwinds her arms and clutches the flannel between her hands, but she doesn’t put it on. “He was an engineer,” she says, and when you hear the past tense your heart drops to your stomach. Shit.

“I’m sorry, I—”

“It’s fine,” Clarke cuts you off, and stops walking. The streetlights turn the wisps of her hair into a delicate blonde halo, but her eyes are shadowed. “It was a few years ago.”

Her knuckles are white as she clutches your shirt to her chest, and on impulse you reach out to her and take it from her, gently, before draping it around her shoulders. Your hands are shaking now too, and you swallow back the nervous energy bubbling up in your throat. When was the last time you felt this way about someone else, this desire to nurture and hold close and look after?

Clarke shrugs into your shirt obediently and flicks you a small smile. “I’m sorry, I’m such a mess tonight,” she admits.

You shrug. “It’s okay. I get that way too sometimes.”

Clarke makes a face. “I snapped at my roommate and ran out of my apartment. She probably thinks I’m a nut-job.” She stops, and huffs a laugh. “Scratch that, she _knows_ I’m a nut-job.”

“My roommate’s the same,” you say, and Clarke looks towards you. “She’s…used to having to drag me out of bed when I try to skip class, and stuff.” You pause, weighing words on your tongue. Do you want to go there? A quick look back at Clarke gives you a glance of earnest blue eyes, and you recognize the fear and desperation behind them. You’ve seen it in the mirror, burning from your own muddy-green eyes. And Clarke needs to know that she’s not alone, and so you try to breathe away your increasing heart rate before you lick your lips and keep talking.

“Last spring she went to the counseling center and told them she was worried about me.”

Clarke’s eyes are wider now, and you feel more than a little bit nauseous, but in for a penny in for a dollar, right? (Or whatever the damn saying is.)

“What did they do?”

You choke out what may have passed for a laugh if you were breathing a little more evenly. “They made me meet with the Dean of students and said they’d kick me out unless I met with one of their counselors every week.”

Clarke makes a soft noise of understanding, maybe, or sympathetic disgust, and you train your eyes on the blurry glow of the lamp-lit night sky above so you can keep talking. “I was really mad at her for a long time. Some days I think I still am.”

“With good reason,” Clarke puts in, and you are jolted from your thoughts by her blue eyes once more. “She went behind your back.”

You shrug noncommittally. Sometimes you feel your relationship with Anya is something of a lost cause. The two of you are still friends, and sometimes you think she’s the only one holding you together, but that breach of trust is something that’s hard to bounce back from, and most days you hardly have the mental energy to even look after yourself, much less try to repair a relationship with your ex-best friend. But all you say to Clarke is, “Yeah.”

Clarke starts walking again, and you hug your arms to your chest as you skip a step to keep up with her. “Do you want to talk about what happened?” Clarke asks delicately, like she’s cupping a butterfly in her palm and trying to keep from crushing its wings, and you feel her voice brush against your heart in a way that’s so kind it hurts you. By this point you’re feeling tired and wrung-out, and you’ve already told her you’re crazy so why not show her the proof? You turn your wrists towards her wordlessly, revealing a handful of dark scars lacing across blue veins like latitude lines, and when she catches her breath you tuck your arms back against your chest.

When you finally have enough courage to look back at Clarke, she’s chewing on the corner of her lip and clearly lost in her own thoughts. You notice she isn’t shaking any more though, and you feel like smiling when you see how your flannel is short on her arms by a good inch and a half. 

She seems to reach an internal decision and her gaze snaps back to yours. “I drove my car into a tree,” she says bluntly, and you blink. “That’s how I broke my wrist.” Clarke shakes her head. “I told them I wasn’t trying to…you know, kill myself or anything, but I don’t think they believe me.”

“What were you trying to do?” You ask, your voice faint, because you know what it feels like, arguing with doctors and telling them that you’re not trying to kill yourself when you cut your wrists or your arms or your ankles, you just —

“I just have a lot of feelings sometimes that I feel like I can’t handle. And I just wanted them to stop.”

“Exactly,” you breathe, and Clarke watches you with a light in her eyes. It feels like a puzzle piece clicking into place, like your hearts are suddenly beating in sync. The sudden, overwhelming feeling that you are _understood_ , and even if you _are_ batshit crazy you’re not the only one. (You always feel like you’re the only one lost in the shadows of your own traitorous mind.)

The two of you just watch each other for a moment, a tiny smile tilting up the corners of your lips, and then Clarke takes a deep, shuddering breath before reaching across the space between you. Her hand hovers over your shoulder before fluttering down and clasping around your own. Her skin is soft and warm against yours — you shiver a little bit; it’s gotten cold again and you gave your shirt to Clarke.

“I’m glad I met you,” she says, and they’re the same words that you’ve been trying to find, so you just smile and squeeze her hand tighter.

—

**Clarke (9:02am):** Good morning! How are you doing?  
 **Lexa (10:01am):** I’m good. How about you? Winding down a little bit after last night?  
 **Clarke (10:03am):** Haha, yeah, mostly. Raven’s sending me weird looks today though.  
 **Lexa (10:05am):** Raven is your roommate?  
 **Clarke (10:05am):** Yeah, I live with her and Octavia. Octavia’s older brother Bellamy crashes a lot too. Also whoever Raven’s present boy-toy is.  
 **Lexa (10:10am):** Wow, sounds like a full house.  
 **Clarke (10:11am):** Yeah, it tends to be a little crowded, but I don’t mind it.  
 **Clarke (10:15am):** You just have the one roommate?  
 **Lexa (10:20am):** Yes, her name is Anya. 

**Clarke (1:00pm):** Hey so I’m really sorry if I was oversharing last night. I really appreciate you listening and not judging me though, it was really nice and helped a lot.  
 **Lexa (1:45pm):** Honestly I feel like I should be the one apologizing for oversharing? You were totally fine.  
 **Clarke (1:47pm):** No no, you were fine too, I swear  
 **Lexa (1:49pm):** I guess we’re both good, then?  
 **Clarke (1:50pm):** Absolutely :)

**Clarke (4:00pm):** Last minute invite, but do you want to come over to my place later? You can bring your work - I have to study too. But Raven and Octavia are both going to be out and I always end up cooking wayyy too much food haha.  
 **Lexa (4:50pm):** Yeah, sure! Can I bring anything?  
 **Clarke (4:52pm):** Just yourself :)  
 **Lexa (4:53pm):** Haha, I think I can manage that.

—

Clarke’s house is an old split townhouse a few blocks off campus, and she shares her front porch with the other half of the occupants. You ring the doorbell and Clarke appears less than thirty seconds later, dishtowel in hand. “Hi!” She says breezily. “Come on in, I’m just making dinner.”

“What are you making?” You let the door close behind you and follow her obediently to the kitchen: a surprisingly large, open room that Clarke and her roommates seemed to keep fairly clean. 

“Quiche, I think.” Clarke shoots a glance at the oven. “Do you like quiche?”

You’ve never had it, but you’re generally not picky. “Sure.”

“Good.” She waves a hand towards what appears to be the living/dining room. “You can put your stuff over there if you want.”

“You said your roommates are out?”

“Yeah, Octavia’s on a date and Raven’s at…something. Society of Women Engineers?”

“What kind of engineer is she?” 

“Mechanical.”

“Anya’s in biomedical.” 

“Oh, cool.” Clarke pokes her head in from the kitchen and you let your backpack slide to the ground. “Do you want anything to drink?”

“Do you have tea?”

“Absolutely. Come check out the pantry.”

You join Clarke in the kitchen and rifle through the little crate of tea she and her roommates have amassed while Clarke putters around behind you.

“Ah, nice!” She says, and you turn around to see her pulling some pie-crusted thing from the oven. “It smells so good.”

You sniff the air experimentally. Ham and cheese and some spices that you can’t identify. “What is quiche anyways?”

Clarke widens her eyes dramatically. “You’ve never had quiche?”

You shake your head. “I wasn’t a country club child, Clarke,” you tease, but she laughs so hard that you realize you’ve pegged her correctly. Child of money, raised in a society where networking is everything. Clarke probably learned at a very young age how to properly butter her rolls and at what angles to arrange her used silverware. 

(Your family has money, but you never saw much of it beyond your father’s extensive wine cellar and the cleanly-tailored suits both your parents wore to work. They didn’t believe in extravagant family vacations or country club memberships, although they _did_ insist you take piano lessons for six years.)

“Here, serve up.” Clarke is offering you a set of wooden tongs and pointing you towards the other pot on the stove, which upon further inspection has broccoli inside. You take some and leave room on your plate for the quiche, which is cooling as Clarke cautiously cuts into it.

“Perfect,” she breathes. “Last time I made this I burned it.”

“I burn everything,” you quip, and she glances up for a brief second to smile at you.

“Good thing I know how to cook, then.”

Dinner is a casual affair with the two of you seated at the table in Clarke’s kitchen (it’s not nearly big enough for a dining table), eating off plastic plates and using old balloon-patterned napkins from the last time someone had a birthday. You’re not quite as relaxed as you were last night, half-drunk on the night air and the stars, but Clarke is an easy conversationalist and you don’t really feel uncomfortable.

“I’m thinking of getting a guinea pig,” you say into a silence, carefully examining the broccoli floret speared on the end of your fork.

When you look up, Clarke’s eyebrows are judging you. “A guinea pig?”

“Yup.” You transfer the broccoli from fork to mouth. “I had one when I was younger and it was a really great pet.”

“I always wanted rats.”

“…rats, really?”

“Yeah, they’re really good pets!” Clarke insisted. “They’re very clean and very affectionate.”

You guess you’ll trust her on that one. You’re about to ask what kind of pets she had growing up when the front door slams open, making both of you jump.

“Oh, hey, Clarke.” A wiry dark-haired girl with a backpack and an armful of textbooks kicks the door closed behind her. “And who’s this?”

“This is Lexa,” Clarke says. You try to smile, but the girl is watching you with a shrewd, calculating gaze that makes you feel a little bit like a rabbit in the view of a snake. “She’s a friend. Lexa, this is Raven.”

“We live together,” Raven adds. “Hi, Lexa.”

“Hello.” Ah, Raven, the engineering roommate.

Raven lets her backpack slide to the floor of the living room and dumps her textbooks unceremoniously on the table across from you and Clarke. The top one is a thick volume titled _Methods of Fluid Mechanics_.

“How’s it going, Clarke?” Raven asks from the kitchen, where she’s cutting into Clarke’s quiche. You can see Clarke’s shoulders creeping towards her ears, and a small part of you would really like to reach across the table and take her hand. 

“Fine, how was your meeting?”

“Meeting was good. You sure you’re fine? Had an okay day?”

“Yes.” Clarke shoots her an exasperated glare. “It was fine, I told you.”

“Well Lexa, how do you know Clarke?” 

You shoot Clarke a quick, panicked glance. She ignores it.

“We met in the library,” Clarke says tightly. Either Raven is incredibly oblivious or she’s choosing to ignore all the hints that Clarke is giving, and when she plops down at the table next to you you figure it’s the latter.

“So you’re friends? Do you hang out a lot?”

“ _Raven_ ,” Clarke snaps, and her eyes are bright with anger. “Can you leave off the fucking inquisition?”

Raven stills, fork clutched between her fingers, and stares Clarke hard in the eyes for a long moment before rolling her own. “Fine, whatever, Princess.”

She reclaims her stack of textbooks and stalks up the stairs beside the front door, leaving the air chilly in her wake. Your eyes are on your plate, cautious, until you hear Clarke take a deep breath.

“Sorry about that,” she says. She’s chewing on the edge of her lip and looks like she’s plotting murder. “Raven’s a nosy jerk sometimes.”

“So is my roommate,” you offer, and Clarke’s shoulders begin to drop away from her ears.

“I haven’t talked to her since I…you know, left last night. So she’s a little worried, I guess.”

“She’s a good friend.” You honestly don’t know what else to say, because you’ve been there, and your reaction to people butting into your business is to shut them down, but that’s not a way to keep friends.

And don’t you know it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm on tumblr @ clarkesmech and have been yelling a lot about Clexa since the season 3 trailer came out.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Consider this a little present in anticipation for season 3 starting tonight :D

The other day when the two of you got coffee, Lexa told you that her parents aren’t big on traditions, or holidays at all really, and it hurt your heart.

“So…you’ve never carved a pumpkin?”

“Never.” And she seemed a little embarrassed about it, so you let it slide, but since then your mind has been on overdrive. 

“Whatcha doing?” From the sound of it, Octavia has claimed the chair across the table from you. You’re in the middle of staring at a map of your town and trying to figure out which way is up.

“Hey, can you help me out?”

“I’ll try.” Instead of walking around the table like a civilized human being, Octavia hops onto it and scoots across until her butt is planted beside your workspace. She steal the pen and paper out from under your elbow and examines them critically, like a judge with a court case.

“Are these apple orchards?”

“Yeah. With pumpkin patches.” Even though it’s probably in the forties outside, Octavia is wearing only a sports bra and shorts, and she smells faintly of cut grass and sweat. So she’s either come from soccer practice or an impromptu scrimmage. “Lexa has never carved a pumpkin before, so I’m taking her to go pick one out.”

“Aww.” Octavia’s arms wind behind her neck as she wrestles her curls into a ponytail. Between her and Raven, you’re constantly pulling dark hair out of the shower drain, and just looking at Octavia combing through her ponytail and pulling out loose hair is enough to make you want to gag. But thus were the challenges of having female roommates.

“Do you know any of the places on there?”

“Lincoln and I have been to Fairmount Orchard. It’s fun.” She shrugs. “It’s more pumpkin-patch-y than apple-orchard-y, though.”

“Awesome.” You swipe your pen and paper back from Octavia. “Could you read back that address to me?”

\\\

“Why won’t you tell me where we’re going?”

Lexa is pouting in the passenger seat of your mother’s Land Rover (you totaled your Civic in the crash, and driving this thing still feels like driving a tank) and you’re trying really hard to keep from grinning, because you can’t remember the last time you’ve been _so thrilled_ about something so small and silly.

(Being with Lexa seems to have that effect on you, and it’s very nice.)

“Because the surprise is half the fun!” 

Lexa makes a soft sort of grumbling sound in response, and you take your eyes off the road for a brief second to see her tilting her head against the window. With a little flicker of gratitude, you realize that she’s probably the first person who’s ridden in the car with you since you the accident — who knows how you broke your wrist. Raven and Octavia always make excuses to get rides with other people, or they refuse to let you drive in the first place, and the fact that Lexa appears to have hopped into your passenger seat without a second thought makes you feel like you’ve swallowed something warm and delicious tasting.

Fairmount Orchard is only about a twenty minute drive from campus, but you’re just about bouncing in your seat by the time you pull into the parking lot, gravel crunching beneath your tires.

“What is this place?” Lexa cranes her neck to try and see out the back window.

“Come find out!” And you know you’re being a little bit ridiculous and (more than a little bit) juvenile, but you’re just so excited to see her reaction that you can’t help but slam the car door behind you and grab her hand before launching into full skip.

“Oh my god, Clarke,” Lexa breathes, and you think she’s laughing at you but you don’t really care, because right around the corner is…

“Pumpkins!” You proclaim, dropping her hand and spreading your arms at the orange-studded field before you like it’s a work of art. And it really kind of is, you think, making mental notes of the way the orange-and-green blend with the tilled brown-and-black soil and the bright blue of the sky above you.

“Is this a pumpkin patch?” Lexa kneels in the dirt and presses gentle fingers to the nearest pumpkin, like she’s worried she’s going to pop it like a balloon.

“Since you said you’d never carved a pumpkin before, I thought…” You drop to your knees beside her and cup a small yellowish pumpkin in your hands. It’s adorable, and you just want to put it on the windowsill of your room.

“How do you know which pumpkins are the good ones?” Lexa’s eyebrows have the tiniest crease between them, like she’s becoming concerned about the whole thing, and it’s even cuter than the tiny pumpkin in your palms.

“There’s no such thing as a bad pumpkin. Unless it’s, like, rotting or something.” You return to a standing position and nudge her with a foot. “Come on, let’s get hunting.”

Before long it becomes clear to you that Lexa is taking this endeavor very seriously. It’s kind of sweet at first, but after forty-five minutes outside in a cold pumpkin patch you can’t feel your toes anymore and it’s quickly losing its charm.

“What about this one?” Lexa is holding a pumpkin in her arms that has to weigh at least twenty pounds, and you can’t help but sigh. All the exertion of lifting gourds has caused her her scarf to untie, and it’s hanging loosely across her collarbones like a gentleman’s undone necktie.

“That’s a big one, all right.”

Lexa looks down at the orange globe for a moment, chewing on her lip, and sets it back down. Her cheeks are pink from the cold. “Let’s go back to the first row again.”

You just barely keep from groaning, and as you trudge back through the rough lanes on Lexa’s heels you try to remind yourself that this was your idea in the first place.

After another ten minutes of hardcore deliberation, Lexa settles on a medium-sized pumpkin with a unique, paleish sort of color to it. She carries it back to the car like it’s a child, whereas you plop yours into the backseat without preamble.

“I’ve decided I’m just going to carve a traditional face,” she announces when you join her in the car and crank up the heat. She’s cradling the pumpkin in her lap, arms wrapped protectively around it, and you smile.

//

“Clarke, is that you?”

“Yeah, we’re home, O.” You kick off your boots by your front door and help Lexa out of her coat. Her scarf has gotten tangled through her curls, and the two of you giggle as she has to spin a slow circle in order to unravel herself. At the sound, Octavia pokes her head out from the kitchen. She’s wearing a faded brown apron that says “KISS THE COOK” and brandishing a ladle like it’s a sword.

“This is my other roommate, Octavia.” You drape Lexa’s coat over a nearby chair and point her towards the kitchen. She’s balancing both pumpkins in her arms, so you take pity on her and reclaim yours.

“Hello,” Lexa says, and her tone is guarded enough that it makes you shoot her a glance. Maybe she’s nervous, considering how her first meeting with Raven went the other week. You try to catch her eye reassuringly, but she’s looking determinedly at her pumpkin like she’s already planning out its design.

“She already met Rae?” Octavia takes your pumpkin from you, sizes it up with an appraising eye, and gives you an approving nod like it’s passed her mental list of gourd specifications. You shake your head minutely, saying _it didn’t go great_ , and Octavia’s mouth softens. 

“So Clarke says you’ve never carved a pumpkin before, Lexa?”

Lexa has seated herself at the dining room table and is fiddling with her phone. “My parents weren’t huge fans of Halloween,” she replies a little defensively. Octavia nods.

“What are you going to do for this one, then?”

“I think I’m just going to go for the traditional face. Two triangle eyes and a mouth.”

“Nice, I like it. You can’t beat the classic jack-o-lantern.”

You hear Lexa exhale, and when you glance up from the knife drawer you see that her shoulders are no longer squeezed up towards her ears. Octavia is very good at putting people at ease when she wants to. (And when she doesn’t want to, you end up dragging her out of bar fights.)

“Do you think this knife will work?” You hold up a paring knife: the best you have in your mismatched collection of cutlery. Between you, Octavia, and Raven you had kitchen stuff pretty much covered, but weird things like spatulas and cutting boards tended to slip through the cracks from time to time.

“Let’s give it a go.” Octavia palms the knife and strides towards the pumpkins like she’s about to gut a fish. Lexa wraps her arms around hers a little protectively.

“Here, use mine.” You nudge your pumpkin towards Octavia, who stabs it without preamble. It makes Lexa jump, but you’ve lived with Octavia for long enough that hardly anything she does surprises you anymore.

The paring knife works to pierce the thick skin of the pumpkin, but it’s too thick and unwieldy for carving designs, Octavia declares after nearly butchering yours in an attempt to create a lid. 

Lexa is looking a little disappointed, and you’re about to become very frustrated with this whole failure of an endeavor when inspiration hits you.

“I’ll be right back.”

//

The paint pens are a huge success. You’re so proud of yourself for saving the evening that you make Octavia give you a high-five. (She tries to sock you in the shoulder instead.)

“That’s the nice thing about living with an artist,” Octavia says. She is sitting cross-legged on the dining room table with your pumpkin in her lap as she draws a series of bold tribal designs around its base with a silver paint pen. “She always has craft supplies.”

Lexa lets out a wordless hum of agreement, the tip of her tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth as she concentrates. You smile and sip from your warm styrofoam cup.

“Thanks for making cider, O,” you say. “It’s very festive.”

“Fall is my favorite. The weather is perfect for soccer and stuff.”

“Do you play?” Lexa looks up from her pumpkin for probably the first time in fifteen minutes, and you’re a little surprised her eyes haven’t begun to cross.

“Yup, for the university.”

You glance over at Octavia's work and elbow her sharply. “No drawing penises on my pumpkin.”

Lexa chokes on a startled laugh, and Octavia sighs. “Aw, _moooom_.”

//

Octavia disappears after getting bored with defacing your pumpkin, and you lose yourself boxing a delicate chevron pattern around the girth of your pumpkin until Lexa’s voice pierces your artistic daze.

“How did you meet Octavia and Raven?”

Ah, and isn’t that a story. You cap your paint pen and blink to refocus on Lexa in the middle distance. She has a paint pen behind her ear, and her face is smooth of the anxious wrinkles that you see so often.

“Do you want the short or the long version?”

Lexa’s lips twitch in a flicker of a smile. “Either is fine.”

“Short story, we went to high school together. Long version…” You trail off and shake your head. “It always sounds so dramatic. We were really dumb teenagers.”

You get more of a smile from Lexa on that one. “I think we all were.”

Encouraged, you press on. “Octavia’s brother Bellamy is a year older than we are. I met him at…art club, I think?” Either art or film club, you can’t really remember - but that part’s not important. “We went on a couple of dates but decided we worked better as friends.” Your shoulders twitch in a shrug. “Which is how I met Octavia.”

“And Raven?”

Thinking about this years later still makes your stomach knot uncomfortably. You take a deep breath, pushing away stirrings of nausea. It’s a long-cemented neural pathway: thinking about Finn makes you want to vomit, or cry, or punch something. (Or drive your car into a tree.) Normally you just tell people that Raven was a friend of Bellamy’s (which is true), but you have an unspoken policy not to lie to Lexa, so you struggle to keep your facial expression relaxed as you say, “Her boyfriend of like five years was cheating on her with me.”

Lexa’s eyes widen. “What happened?”

Another shrug as you continue to fight the tension beginning to sing in your veins. “We figured it out and both dumped him. And that was that.” You force yourself to take a sip of your cider, now room temperature and flat-tasting. 

Lexa can either read your body language or she knows you well enough by now to change the topic, so she clears her throat. “My girlfriend moved to Australia without telling me. She just didn’t show up for school one day."

You let out a startled laugh that pulls you from the beginnings of your anxious spiral. “What happened?”

“Her dad’s job. I guess she didn’t want to tell me, so she…didn’t.”

“How long had you been dating?”

“Two years.” Lexa’s tone is flat, but her eyes are bright, like she’s inviting you to join her in ridiculing the absurdity of the situation.

“Well. That definitely sucks.” You take a deep breath, feeling your heart beginning to slow in your chest. “Did you know Anya from high school too?”

“Yeah. She and Costia both played field hockey.”

Costia. So Lexa was gay, or at least bi. It wasn’t a huge surprise, you mused to yourself, even though your gaydar was technically shit and wired more by wishful thinking than any sort of external cues. 

“Have you dated anyone in college?”

Lexa shakes her head. “I’m not good at letting people in,” she admits, but it’s with that same frankness that lets you know that she’s not feeling sorry for herself, just stating the facts. “You?”

“No. A couple of hook-ups, but that’s it.” It had really only been Niylah, that girl in your freshman anthropology class, who had been your first sexual encounter with a girl. It was nice - and cemented the fact that you were definitely bisexual - but you had never crossed paths after that and were content to let it lie.

Lexa gives you a single, firm nod in confirmation, and goes back to decorating her pumpkin with the eye of an artist.

—

 **Lexa (2:15pm):** Did you get your paint pens at the craft store?  
**Clarke (2:15pm):** Yeah, why?  
**Lexa (2:17pm):** Anya is jealous of the pumpkin I brought home last night and wants to decorate one of her own.  
**Lexa (2:17pm):** :-)  
**Clarke (2:18pm):** Haha I love it!! Please send pictures once she’s done :)  
**Lexa (2:18pm):** Aye aye, captain.

 **Lexa (4:20pm):** Also, um.  
**Lexa (4:20pm):** I got a guinea pig.  
**Clarke (4:25pm):** !!!!!!!!!!!! SEND ME A PICTURE!!!!!!  
**Lexa (4:32pm):**

**Lexa (4:34pm):** Her name is Fava because she’s a precious little bean.  
**Clarke (4:34pm):** omg  
**Clarke (4:34pm):** When can I meet her  
**Clarke (4:34pm):** Now? Is now okay?  
**Clarke (4:35pm):** Lexa Woods I’m going to actually die if I can’t see this cute animal in person soon  
**Lexa (4:38pm):** Haha, well someone is excited. And yes, come on over! I’ll send you my address.  
**Clarke (4:38pm):** Be there in 6 minutes.

—

The address Lexa gives you is for a small apartment on-campus in an area usually favored by the sophomores and juniors. Lexa had admitted the other day that part of her agreement with the counseling center required her to live on campus, and Anya had had no chance to find other housing before the school year started. The apartments aren’t bad at all, they’re just in a noisier part of campus, full of parties thrown by students happy to be free of the constraints of the freshman dorms. It’s a Sunday afternoon though, and the party-goers have retreated to the library to catch up on their studies, so you don’t see a soul after the RA who lets you into Lexa’s building.

You think you have the right address, and you double-check the number written on the back of your hand before knocking. There’s a long moment of silence, and you’re about to back off when there is movement on the other side of the door.

“Clarke!” Lexa looks more tousled than usual, with sweatpants and her hair pulled back in a messy bun. However she’s grinning in a free and open way that you don’t get to see that often, so you grin back and follow her inside. “I’m sorry, I guess someone swiped you into the building?”

“Yeah, an RA.” You take a moment to check out the cozy common room/kitchen combination just beyond the front door. “I haven’t been in these apartments before. Are they nice?”

Lexa shrugs. “Nice enough. It’s great to have a full kitchen.” She glances around the room herself, uninterested, then looks back at you with another smile teasing at her lips. “So do you want to come meet Fava?”

You can’t help but laugh again at the name. “You’ve seen _Silence of the Lambs_ , right?”

“Yeah, why?” Lexa asks, but after a moment the confusion on her face melts into a look of horror. “Oh. Oh god. I didn’t even think about that.”

“No, no, it’s an adorable name. I’m sure most people won’t think Hannibal.”

“Right,” she says, still looking a little concerned. “Anyway, she’s back in my room.”

Lexa leads you past a bathroom and a closed door (“that’s Anya’s room, I think she’s in there studying”), then to her room, which is the last one at the end of the short hallway. The room is far smaller than yours in your off-campus house, but Lexa probably pays less rent and has the convenience of being close to campus center. Her bed is pushed against the far wall, covers ruffled, and a small desk catty-corner is dominated by a large grid calendar. The whole place is tidy verging on sparse, with no wall decorations and only one framed photograph on her desk.

In the photograph, a tiny Lexa sits at a picnic table, watermelon-sticky and flashing a grin with missing front teeth. On one side is a young woman, pretty, with Lexa’s curls and firm chin. She has one arm wrapped around Lexa’s shoulders, and her lips are parted in the beginnings of a laugh. 

“You’re adorable,” you tease, picking up the frame for a closer look. The picture is clearly a candid, and when you look again you can see the edge of the photographer’s thumb pressed against the lens of the camera. “How old were you?”

“Six, I think?” Lexa is at your shoulder, smiling fondly. “I love this picture.”

“Who’s taking it?”

“My dad.” Her eyes linger on the picture in your hands, and she’s standing close enough in the confines of the small bedroom that you can feel her breath as she exhales, then turns away from you. “Hey, Fava, want to meet Clarke?”

You leave the photo behind and find Lexa kneeling by the foot of her bed, where you now see the white-wire cage flush with the wall. You kneel beside her, arms brushing.

“She’s a little shy still, but she’ll warm up.” Lexa’s tone is soft, and she unlatches the cage to reach in and lift a blue plastic hut. “Hi, Fava-baby.”

“Oh,” you breathe, sighing at the small fluffy creature scrambling to hide back under the hut again. She’s tawny-brown with a white blaze down her nose, and her eyes are wide and bright. “She’s adorable.”

“Yeah.” Lexa is smiling down at Fava with such affection in her eyes that it almost makes you tear up, which is a little weird but you’re almost on your period so it makes sense that you’re feeling a little more emotional than usual. Fava scuffles in the wood shavings and disappears back into her hiding place again.

“And there she is.” Lexa meets your eyes, a little shyly you think, and it’s probably still your hormones but all you want to do is touch her in this moment, so you tilt your head to rest on her shoulder. Her hair is soft against your forehead, and you notice with a flicker of amusement that she smells a little bit like alfalfa.

“Well if you ever need anyone to pet-sit…” You offer, and with your cheek pressed to her shoulder you feel Lexa chuckle.

//

“I can’t believe you’ve never seen Parks and Rec before,” you say around a mouthful of popcorn. Lexa is too put-together to do something as sloppy as talk with food in her mouth, so she just shoots you a teasing glare.

“It’s magical,” you continue once you’ve swallowed and are in no danger of spewing half-chewed kernels across Lexa’s living room couch. “Leslie Knope is a queen among women.”

“I like April,” Lexa says, leaning forward to click “next” on her laptop’s Netflix window. You break into a laugh, because of _course_ Lexa likes April.

“That’s because you basically _are_ April.” 

“No, I’m not!” Lexa grumbles. “I’m not creepy and obsessed with dead bodies.”

“But you’re tacit and grouchy and _adorably_ loyal, even though you try to hide it,” you say stubbornly. This has been something that you’ve been thinking about for weeks; you have specific scenes and everything to back up your theory.

“Well then who are you?” Lexa folds her arms across her chest. “Leslie?”

You roll your eyes dramatically. “Puh- _lease_ , I’m such an Ann it’s not even funny.”

Lexa eyes her laptop screen pensively, where it’s paused at the beginning of the episode’s cold open. “You do have the nursing thing going for you.”

“Not just the nursing thing! I’m perky and a great friend and only _slightly_ neurotic.”

Lexa’s lips twitch. “Okay, fine. Can you go make more popcorn?”

You pout at her for a moment before throwing back the blanket the two of you are tucked under and heading to the microwave. You’re examining the flat popcorn packet to see which side is up when a door opens somewhere down the hallway, and a girl who could only be Lexa’s roommate Anya appears.

“I thought I smelled popcorn,” she announces, raising her aristocratic nose to catch a whiff of the buttery goodness you and Lexa have been chowing down on for the last half hour. Anya is fierce-looking and intimidating, even more so than Raven or even Lexa — her hair is pulled back against the nape of her neck in a ballerina’s stern bun, and she stands with her arms tight to her chest and her shoulders thrown back like she _owns_ this room and you’re nothing but a measly trespasser.

In spite of yourself, you gulp.

“Is that Anya?” Lexa calls over from the sofa, and her roommate brushes by you on her way to the living room.

“Who else would it be?”

“We’re watching Parks and Recreation.”

Anya’s eyes light on the laptop screen, sharp and bordering on judgmental. However, she says, “I’ve heard good things about that,” and pops forward to steal a handful out of the popcorn bowl in Lexa’s lap.

“I’m Clarke,” you say, feeling a little awkward, and Anya’s predatory gaze flicks back over towards you.

“Anya,” she says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Her words are polite and genuine, despite her prickly appearance, and you find yourself beginning to relax a little. “Lexa wanted me to come meet Fava.”

“Fava? Oh, the guinea pig.” Anya looks unimpressed. “I told her she shouldn’t get a pet.”

“It’s not like you ever have to see her,” Lexa says, her tone starting to get defensive. “She lives in _my_ room anyways.”

“It’s a huge time commitment,” Anya argues. “And animals smell.”

“Not if you keep their cages clean.”

This is clearly an argument they’ve started before, and you turn to busy yourself with the microwave, rustling the bag and hitting buttons on the microwave a few extra times to remind them that there is a third person in the room. But it has no apparent effect on the girls behind you, whose voices are rising in volume.

“You don’t need a pet when you can’t even take care of _yourself_ , for fuck’s sake!”

Silence — the kind of awkward, immediate gap in the conversation that leaves Anya’s last words ringing in your ears. You can’t help but peek over your shoulder. Lexa’s hands have tightened into fists in her lap, and she looks positively livid.

“Get out,” she snaps, her eyes venomous, and you feel ice lick up your spine. With a muttered curse, Anya spins on her heel and stalks back to her room, slamming the door pointedly behind her.

The first kernel of popcorn explodes like a firecracker in the silence, making you jump. Lexa’s gaze has dropped to her lap, and her shoulders are tucked in like a shell around her soft center. 

“Hey,” you say gently, but she doesn’t look at you until you sink down onto the couch beside her, making sure you’re close enough for your thighs to brush. You know it’s helpful for you in situations like this to have physical contact to ground you, and you hope that Lexa is the same. She doesn’t pull away from the touch, at least.

“She’s such an ass,” Lexa whispers. “ _Such_ an ass.”

Her fists are clenched so tightly that she’s likely cutting into skin with her fingernails, so you reach down and carefully pry her hands open. She looks down when you interlace your fingers with hers, as if startled to see someone here in this moment with her, and she lets you rub her hand between your palms in a soft massage.

“It’s okay,” you say. “She’s wrong, and we both know that. Fava is an excellent idea.” You pause. “In fact, do you want to go hold her? Press her soft and fluffy face against yours and all that?”

Lexa chokes on a shard of a laugh. “Yes. I think that’s a good idea.”

Fava does not seem to mind behind held, and as Lexa cradles her to her chest and strokes her tawny head, her shoulders begin to loosen, and you allow yourself to finally take a breath as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm clarkesmech on tumblr. Come reblog all the 100 things and get emotional with me.
> 
> Additionally! I have several tags set up on my tumblr that I use for writing inspiration. You can find them under "clarke aesthetic," "lexa aesthetic," and most importantly "psych au." There are sliiiight spoilers for future chapters in the psych au tag, considering that's where I'm storing my ideas, so feel free to avoid that one if you'd like!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a flashback in the center of this chapter that's italicized -- it contains graphic descriptions of blood and a clear mention of self-harm, which may be triggering. Please take care of yourselves and skip this section if reading it will hurt you.
> 
> Additionally, I owe many many thanks to Heather for reading this and calming my fears and telling me to post the damn thing already. She is @hollsteinstrash on tumblr, and following her will be the best thing you do today (besides reading this fic).

_That’s why I’m standing on the overpass screaming at myself, “Hey, I wanna get better!”_  
“I Wanna Get Better” - The Bleachers

 

 **Raven (8:45am):** Hey are you up?  
**Clarke (8:46am):** Yeah, I have class at 9:30.  
**Clarke (8:47am):** Why what’s up?  
**Raven (8:50am):** Nothing  
**Raven (8:51am):** What are you doing later?  
**Clarke (8:55am):** Um going over to Lexa’s I think. We were going to make dinner and stuff.  
**Raven (8:56am):** Ok nvm  
**Clarke (9:00am):** Did you need something?  
**Clarke (9:20am):** Raven?

 **Octavia (9:30am):** Has Raven texted you?  
**Clarke (9:45am):** I’m in class but yeah why  
**Clarke (9:45am):** She’s being weird  
**Octavia (9:47am):** She broke up with Wick last night. Or, he dumped her.  
**Clarke (9:49am):** Oh shit hold on

—

“Clarke?”

“Octavia?” You breathe. Your voice sounds loud in the tiled confines of the girls’ bathroom, and you lower it. “What’s going on?”

Rustling on the other end of the phone. “Yeah, so Wick dumped her.” Octavia’s voice is low and harsh and she sounds like she’s a heartbeat away from finding this guy and clawing his throat out, and it makes something within you soar. Octavia is fierce and finicky, but she’s _your_ fierce and finicky, and she would go to the ends of the earth for you and Raven. You know such strong, amazing women.

“I’m assuming it wasn’t mutual?”

“Hardly.” A sardonic laugh. “He was the first guy she’d started to let in since Finn.”

You give a low hiss, pushing past the jump in your heart rate that always happens when Octavia mentions Finn. “Asshole.”

“Yeah. So she’s in a bad way.”

“Really?” You lean back against the rough stall divider and prop your head back against it. “Like how?”

“Went for ‘a drive’ this morning,” you can hear the air-quotes, “and hasn’t come back yet.”

“So she’s likely halfway to Chicago by now,” you fill in dryly. Raven is the queen of running from her feelings, and more than once she’s taken off without a word, then called you or Octavia from the middle of nowhere because she’s out of gas.

“Yeah, probably.” Octavia sighs. “I’m going to text her and tell her to come back. We’ll have a roommate movie night or something.”

“O, I wish I could, but I already have plans. Lexa and I are getting dinner.”

A pause on Octavia’s end. “Can’t you just reschedule? Rae needs us, Clarke.”

You worry the corner of your lip between your teeth. “Let me ask Lexa.”

“Okay. Call me back.”

You end Octavia’s call and go straight to Lexa’s contact. The class you’re missing is the farthest thing from your mind at this point, and you’re still biting at your lip when Lexa picks up.

“Hi, Clarke.”

“Lexa.” You give a giant, relieving exhale, and Lexa chuckles on the other end of the line.

“What’s up?”

You explain the situation quickly, starting with Raven’s weird text messages this morning and ending with the conversation you’d had with Octavia. “And I told her I couldn’t because we have plans already…”

“Clarke,” Lexa interrupts you. “Don’t worry about our plans. Be there for your friend.”

“But you’re my friend too,” you say, and you know you’re whining a little bit, but this is not a fun situation and you’d really rather spend the night with Lexa than with a grumpy and pissed-off Raven. “And this was supposed to be celebrating the end of your research paper.” Lexa had been running herself into the ground for the last two weeks over this project, and you’ve been _trying_ not to watch her like a hawk, but you know she doesn’t handle stress well, and you want to be there if she needs you.

“We can do that another time.” Is she brushing you off? Is she upset with you?

“Lexa, I —“

“You don’t have to ditch your friends for me, Clarke,” Lexa interrupts you again, her tone a little snappier than before. “I’m not going to _die_ if we don’t see each other, you know.” And she’s trying to be light-hearted, but it really just makes your lungs tighten with worry.

“I worry about you,” you admit, and you squeeze your eyes shut in frustration when Lexa seems to be taking her sweet time to respond.

“You don’t need to,” she finally says. “I’m honestly probably just going to crash early.”

“Are you sure?”

“ _Yes._ Seriously, I will let you know if I need anything, okay? Go be with your roommate.” Her words are firm but her tone is softer now, and your shoulders begin to relax away from your ears.

“Okay. I’ll text you later.”

“Talk to you later, Clarke.”

—

 **Clarke (10:01pm):** Hey are you still up?  
**Lexa (10:05pm):** Yes ma’am. How’s Raven?  
**Clarke (10:06pm):** oh thank god  
**Clarke (10:06pm):** She’s okay. I just needed to get away from her cloud of negativity for a breather.  
**Lexa (10:07pm):** Haha I know the feeling.  
**Clarke (10:08pm):** She’s bitching about Wick and about how she feels like she wasted the last few months with him and it’s just like, at least you HAD someone to date  
**Clarke (10:08pm):** Considering I’ve been single since Finn and am basically so full of baggage that no one’s ever going to want me ahahh  
**Clarke (10:08pm):** ugh sorry, that was super negative. I’ve just had a little too much of my roommates today.  
**Lexa (10:09pm):** No need to apologize, sometimes you just need to vent. That’s what I’m here for.  
**Lexa (10:09pm):** And I totally understand on both counts — the being single and the being crazy, haha.  
**Lexa (10:10pm):** (and for the record, I don’t think you’re too full of baggage. We all have it.)  
**Clarke (10:12pm):** Ahh thanks. For letting me vent and for being reassuring.  
**Clarke (10:12pm):** Also I’m going to make tonight up to you  
**Clarke (10:12pm):** Want to drive up to the soccer fields and stargaze tomorrow night? Since you’re an uneducated bum and never learned the constellations ;)  
**Lexa (10:15pm):** Oh neat! Yeah, that sounds like fun :-)  
**Clarke (10:16pm):** yayyy!! :D I’ll pick you up at 8

—

The night is cold and clear, and your breath forms a gentle fog between you and the stars. Being away from campus has done wonders for the light pollution - here, lying on a blanket in the middle of the soccer fields with Lexa, you can almost see the Milky Way.

It’s done wonders for your anxiety levels too. The movie night with Raven had gone okay, and she had been appreciative in her own sarcastic way, but today she’s been in a truly foul mood and it’s really starting to get under your skin. You had spent twenty minutes earlier picking at your cuticles when Raven slammed her way around the kitchen making lunch, and when she had finally vanished back to her room you had looked down and been entirely surprised to see blood crusting your nails.

But here, with the warmth of the flannel beneath you and Lexa beside you, you feel the ice locking up your nerves beginning to melt again.

“So what’s that one?”

You turn your head to see Lexa pointing up at a cluster of stars overhead. Her hair is loose around her shoulders and she’s wearing a crimson-colored knit cap that blends into the darkened colors of the night. You follow her finger.

“That one?” You point at the faded “W” of Cassiopeia. Lexa shakes her head.

“No, more to the left, I think.” She tries to gesture to it, and you giggle.

“This is impossible.”

“No, here.” Lexa wraps her fingers around your wrist and guides your arm until it’s pointing at two o’clock. Her bare fingers are chilly on the skin past the sleeve of your coat, and you make a mental note to give her your extra pair of gloves.

“Oh.” You study the stars for a second. “Not sure. It may just be stars.”

Lexa snorts and lets your hand drop. “I could have told you that.”

You fish the gloves from your pocket and toss them onto her chest. “Your hands are freezing.”

“Well, it is November.”

The two of you fall silent again, eyes skipping lazily over the points of light above you. You reach over and grab Lexa’s wrist this time, and direct her hand until she’s pointing at the Big Dipper.

“Okay, quiz time. What’s that one?”

Lexa is quiet for a moment, and when you glance over at her, her eyes are glistening in the ambient light of the stars.

“The Big Dipper?” She guesses, and you nudge her happily with your shoulder.

“Yep! Also known as Ursa Major, or the Big Bear.”

“Nice.” There is a light, playful smile on Lexa’s lips, and you release her wrist but twine your fingers with hers as your hands flop to the blanket between you.

“I’m glad you came up here with me,” you say, and you don’t know why you’re whispering, but something about the gravity of this moment seems to demand respect.

Her smile widens. “Me too,” she whispers back, and you think her eyes dart down to your mouth, but you can’t really tell because you’re looking at her lips and wishing suddenly and fiercely that you could kiss them right now.

Then Lexa looks away, back up towards the stars, and the moment is broken. There is a small pinch of sadness in your chest as you let your gaze drift to the heavens again as well.

“Oh, Clarke, look!” Lexa exclaims after a moment, smacking at you blindly. A shooting star arcs across the sky like a splash of water, brief and brilliant enough to leave a line in your vision when you blink.

“Did you make a wish?”

“Of course,” she replies, and you glance over to see her smirking at you. “But I can’t tell you what it was.”

“Duh, of course not,” you tease back, but the echo of the kiss-that-almost-was is weighing heavily in your stomach, and you think that’s what you wished for.

—\\\ —

_One year ago_

_It was quiet that evening when Anya returned to the apartment._

_“I’m home!” She called back towards Lexa’s room, letting her backpack and gym bag slide to the floor with a collective thud. “Have you made dinner yet?”_

_There was no reply. Anya grabbed a pot from the drying rack and filled it with water, then moved it over to the stove. It had been a long day, she was sore from the gym, and she didn’t think she had the energy to make anything fancier than pasta. “Lexa?” She yelled again. “Do you want pasta?”_

_A moment, then a muffled “No thanks!” coming from somewhere in the back of the apartment. Lexa had likely had a long day too — her schedule on Tuesdays was crazy — so Anya threw an extra handful of noodles into the pot in case her roommate changed her mind._

_While the water was heating, Anya slouched against the kitchen counter and checked her phone. That girl from her calculus class was texting her again. She shook her head and typed out a non-committal response. The girl was cute and wicked smart, but Anya prided herself on being very choosy about potential partners, and Calculus Brunette hadn’t quite impressed her yet._

_The water boiled over while Anya had her back to it, which she didn’t catch until she heard the droplets hissing into steam as they hit the burner. She shoved her phone into her back pocket and redirected her attention to the stove until 7-9 minutes had passed and the pasta was soft enough to be palatable._

_“I’ve got some extra if you want any!” She yelled back over her shoulder as she transferred the noodles to a colander over the sink. No response from Lexa, which wasn’t unusual, but the lack of music drifting out of her bedroom was. Lexa liked to listen to Pandora while she studied, which Anya was okay with about 70 percent of the time (depending on the station), and it was odd to have silence in the apartment for once._

_She had made way too much pasta, as always, and after she had eaten her fill Anya snapped the extra into a tupperware container to stick in the fridge. She could have it for lunch tomorrow, or maybe Lexa would decide she was hungry after all._

_Speaking of Lexa, what was the little twerp up to? Normally she had at least poked her head out by now to say hello._

_“Lex, you’re not banging someone back there, are you?” Anya chuckled to herself as she headed back towards Lexa’s room. “Why are you so quiet?”_

_She paused in Lexa’s doorway, one hand on the frame, and froze, the smile falling from her face._

_Lexa was sitting cross-legged on her bedroom floor, covered in blood._

_She looked up when Anya choked on her breath, but her eyes were flat, like she wasn’t_ really _looking up at her. Her hands were entirely red, and crimson smears wound up her forearms and calves like macabre body jewelry._

 _For a split second, Anya thought she was going to vomit. Her heart was thundering in her ears and the little voice of self-preservation in the back of her head was whispering_ run, run, _but she made herself kneel on the carpet in front of her roommate._

_“Lexa,” she said, trying to remain calm. “What happened?” She couldn’t see any gushing wound, no broken bones poking up through porcelain skin._

_Lexa turned her hands over, palms-up, and stared at them like they weren’t her own. “I couldn’t stop,” she said, and her tone was so_ eerily _calm that Anya shivered._

_“Okay,” she said slowly. Lexa’s elbow was unmarked by blood, and Anya wrapped her fingers around it gently. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”_

_She got to her feet and let Anya lead her to the bathroom. She stood patiently, silently, as Anya wet paper towels and sponged them up and down Lexa’s arms until her hands were shaking so badly she couldn’t continue._

_“Okay,” Anya said again, trying to swallow back the visceral sense of panic that was making her body unreliable. Her pulse was still loud in her ears, and her mind felt clouded and dull. She took a deep breath, and the scent of blood saturating the small confines of the bathroom lanced through the fog of Anya’s mind like an arrow. She clasped her own hands together tightly to stop the shaking. “Okay, Lexa.”_

_Lexa met her gaze, but her eyes were still distant._

_“Can you wash off your hands?"_

_“Yeah.” The faucet was already running, and Lexa obediently stuck her hands beneath the water. The streams from her blood-stained knuckles were red-brown, and soon the sink was stained like a child’s fingerpainting project._

_“Okay.” Anya was a broken echo in her own ears. The world felt like it were moving in slow motion — she could see every droplet of water as it dripped into the sink’s basin in individual, rust-colored orbs. “That’s good. Let’s clean off your legs now. Can you hop up on the counter?”_

_Lexa did, and Anya got to work on her lower legs. She could see them now, faint slices on Lexa’s ankles with clotted blood beading around them. There were three on one leg and one on the other, and when she looked back to her arms she could see two identical lines across the insides of her wrists._

_There were large bandaids in the bathroom cabinet just for situations like this, and Anya steadied her breathing as she dressed Lexa’s wounds. None of them looked deep or like they would require stitches, but the amount of_ blood…

_She’d check on them tomorrow and decide if a trip to the ER was warranted._

_Lexa stirred beneath her ministrations, and Anya looked up to see her roommate staring back at her, the empty gaze of before beginning to lift. “I’m sorry,” Lexa whispered, and her soft, sad voice really just made Anya_ angry, _and she gritted her teeth. The rage licking up her throat was red-hot and strong enough to pierce through the fog, bringing her crashing back into the present moment._

_“Can you get your razors and bring them to me?” Anya said, struggling to keep her voice neutral. Lexa slid from the counter and disappeared back to her room, reappearing a moment later with a palmful of silver objects. Anya took them and stuck them in her own pocket._

_“How do you feel?”_

_Lexa shrugged, eyes on the floor. “Better.”_

_“Okay.” Anya took a deep breath and squeezed her eyes shut. “You’re going to go to the library for a little bit, but you will text me if you need anything. All right?”_

_“Yeah.”_

_It took Lexa a few minutes to gather her books and laptop, and Anya made sure she was dressed for the cold walk to the library, and then she was gone, the door closing behind her._

_Anya grabbed the nearest mug and hurled it against the wall. It shattered. Tea splashed across the painted cinderblocks, murky brown, and Anya sank to the floor and buried her face in her hands._

I can’t fucking do this anymore.

—\\\\--

Clarke drives you back to campus from the soccer fields, and you let your hand drape out the window to trace lazy air-snakes in the wind flowing by. She’s spent a few minutes fiddling with her iPod and the radio, and when she finally settles on a track, the sound of a faint acoustic guitar fills the car.

“What’s this song?” You ask, pulling your hand back into the car and taking a moment to wrestle with your wind-whipped curls.

“It’s called ‘Breathe,’ I think. Raven burned it on a CD for me forever ago.”

“It’s nice.”

“Yeah.” Clarke reaches over and turns up the volume. A man’s husky voice tells you _don’t forget / to breathe / don’t forget to breathe_. “There are exhales built into the music and everything.”

When you listen closely you can hear them - soft puffs of air interspersed between the guitar chords - and you find yourself weighing your own breaths so that they match up with the track.

“I listen to this sometimes when I’m having a panic attack,” Clarke admits, sounding a little sheepish, and you nod encouragingly. “It helps to have something concrete to time my breathing to.”

“I like that,” you hum, and she glances over at you with a quick, grateful smile.

“Do you have any songs? You know, that make you feel better or whatever.”

Hmm. You turn the question over in your mind for a moment, although you immediately know one that comes to mind. “‘Marchin’ On’ by OneRepublic.”

Clarke makes a soft sound of agreement. “That’s a great one.”

“Yeah.”

The next song is a live recording, complete with the screams of a stadium of adoring fans, and when you hear who comes to the mic, you arch an eyebrow at Clarke.

“Taylor Swift?”

“Shut up,” Clarke blurts out, blushing, and you grin. “It’s a nice cover, okay?” But she skips past it.

The next song begins with a series of piano chords that strike something familiar in you. You recognize it a second later when the lyrics start. _“Hey I hear the voice of a preacher from the back room / Calling my name and I follow just to find you.”_

“Who’s this cover by?” You ask curiously, leaning forward and turning up the volume yourself. 

“Against the Current,” Clarke answers, flicking you a glance. “Do you know it?”

“Yeah, I know the original, by The Bleachers.” An anthem of sleepless nights in the dark of your room, staring up at the ceiling fan and trying to find the strength to push through until the next morning. “I love it.”

When the chorus comes around, Clarke cranks down the driver’s side window and tosses her hair back into the wind. “ _I didn’t know I was lonely ‘till I saw your face,_ ” she croons along, her voice surprisingly sweet, and you can’t help but duck your head and grin, but you don’t sing along.

Not for another couple of lines, anyway.

By the second chorus you’re feeling the music in your bones and forget all traces of self-consciousness to belt along with Clarke: “ _I wanna get better / better, better, better / I wanna get better!_ ” 

—

 **Astronomer Extraordinaire (9:00am):** Good morning!  
**Lexa (9:04am):** I’m sorry, who is this?  
**Astronomer Extraordinaire (9:05am):** It’s Clarke, ya doofus.  
**Astronomer Extraordinaire (9:05am):** Oh shit, I changed my name in your phone, didn’t I.  
**Lexa (9:06am):** Hah, very funny.  
**Clarke (9:07am):** I thought so :)  
**Clarke (9:07am):** Hey so what are you doing tomorrow night?  
**Lexa (9:09am):** Nothing, I don’t think. Saturdays are my homework nights.  
**Clarke (9:10am):** Laaaaaaame.  
**Clarke (9:10am):** Want to come see me in an open mic night instead?  
**Lexa (9:11am):** An open mic night? Are you singing?  
**Clarke (9:12am):** You’ll have to come to find out! ;)  
**Clarke (9:13am):** (Yes, I’m singing)  
**Lexa (9:13am):** That’s awesome! Absolutely. Text me the time and place and I’ll be there :-)

—

What do you even _wear_ to an open mic night?

Your bed is littered with discarded clothes, and you frown into your closet mirror at what will have to be your final outfit, because you want to get there early enough to get a good seat.

“You’re going to be late.” Anya leans against your bedroom door, and you spare her half a glance before turning back to your reflection.

“Does this look okay?” You fret, pivoting on your heel to try and see the shirt from all angles. Does it bunch weirdly in the back?

“Yes, it does,” Anya says, surprisingly sincere. “You should head out though.”

It’s just a pair of jeans and a red sweater, but you pair it with boots and a leather jacket and you actually feel like you look _nice_ , which doesn’t happen all that often. You give yourself a final look-over before slinging your purse over your shoulder and going on your way.

The open mic is taking place in one of the campus Starbucks after-hours, and people have pulled chairs from all corners of the cafe to cluster around the small raised stage against the back wall. It’s not a large group, maybe twenty or so people, but you hover uncertainly by the door and try to scope out the crowd. Nope, nobody you know.

Except —

“Lexa!” Octavia is waving at you from the front row, and you go to join her. “We saved you a seat!”

You thank her and slide into the folding chair beside her. Raven is on Octavia’s other side, which is making you a little bit uncomfortable given how your last interaction went, but as the three of you begin to talk (about the weather, about classes, about Clarke) you realize that Raven is far less tense than the impression she’d originally given off. She reminds you a little bit of Anya in that way — initially terrifying, but she softens with time. Around Octavia, in this casual setting, Raven is completely relaxed. She’s blunt and more than a little bit crass, but she smiles easily and laughs loudly and your shoulders begin to loosen.

“Clarke said she’s number eight, I think?” Octavia says, checking her phone for updates. “Right before intermission.”

“This thing has an intermission?” Raven asks incredulously.

Octavia shrugs. “I guess so people can get coffee and Starbucks can make their money.”

You can’t think of the last time you went to a live music event, but as the night progresses you can’t believe you’ve waited until now to attend one of these. Most of the “acts” are one or two undergrads with an acoustic guitar singing covers of Jack Johnson songs, but there are the occasional larger groups with bass and drum players. The atmosphere is so open and warm, and every time someone goes on stage they’re greeted with a round of welcoming applause. It doesn’t seem to matter how good of a musician people are: all that matters is that they had the courage to get up and share their passion.

You’ve fallen into a state of lazy comfort when Octavia sends a very sharp elbow into your ribs.

“Clarke is up next!” She hisses, ignoring your grumble of pain. “So what, standing ovation or cat-calls?”

“Standing ovation,” you reply, only because the idea of cat-calling and drawing _that_ much attention to yourself is enough to make you want to melt into the floor. Maybe you’ll just let Octavia and Raven be the obnoxious friends while you smile encouragingly from the sidelines.

And there’s Clarke, coming onto the stage with a guitar clutched in one hand. You had no idea she played, but as she settles onto a stool and messes with her tuning pegs she looks completely and utterly at home.

She tosses her glorious blonde hair over her shoulders, and Octavia and Raven let loose with a pair of ear-splitting whistles that makes her laugh.

“Sorry about my friends,” Clarke says into the microphone. “They’re ready for me to sing already so they can go home.” A soft rumble of laughter goes through the audience, and Octavia giggles at your right.

Clarke adjusts the microphone stand one final time and leans in. “So hi everyone, my name is Clarke, and I have a couple of covers for you here tonight. First we’re going to start with an acoustic version of ‘Ocean Avenue’ by Yellowcard.” 

Well isn’t that a flashback to middle school. Clarke settles back onto the stool and tilts her chin down so she’s watching her fingers more than the audience, and she begins to play.

Her arrangement of the song is poignant, turning an alt-rock song into a ballad. Her voice is warm and husky, and it soars on the high notes of the chorus, sending goosebumps down your arms. By the time she finishes your heart is racing and your cheeks feel flushed, and the only thing you can do with all these feelings bubbling in your chest is applaud with great enthusiasm.

Who knew you had a such a thing for musicians.

(Although, to be fair, Clarke could work at a sewer plant and you’d still find her unbelievably attractive.)

“Thank you,” Clarke says into the microphone as the applause dies away. “I had a lot of fun arranging that one.” She fiddles with the microphone stand again and then lets her hands still against her guitar strings. Then you blink and she’s looking straight at you for the first time since she took the stage, her eyes bright and blue and only a few feet away.

“This next song has always been one of my favorites. The lyrics in particular…well, they’ve been speaking to me lately,” she says, and she looks like she’s trying very hard not to smile. Raven leans over to whisper something in Octavia’s ear, and you can’t hear what she says, but Octavia sends you a fleeting glance before her lips curve into a slow grin.

You’re too busy trying to figure out what that was all about to hear the title of the next song, but the opening chords of the song are familiar. It’s “Drops of Jupiter” by Train, but you can tell it’s Taylor Swift’s cover that she played for you in her car the other day. Clarke is looking up from her guitar more this time as she sings, letting her gaze wander the audience, but her eyes seem to always land in the same place: back on you, sitting front and center.

_“Now that she’s back in the atmosphere with drops of Jupiter in her hair, hey. She acts like summer and walks like rain, reminds me that there’s a time to change, hey.”_

You’ve always loved this song, and Clarke’s arrangement skills have transformed it into something soft and longing with lyrics that are, overall, quite sweet and more than a little bit romantic.

She doesn’t change the female pronouns.

This girl is actually going to be the death of you.

Your hands are shaking a little bit in your lap - with anxiety or joy or just plain overwhelming desire, you have no idea - and you squeeze them tightly together as Clarke smiles through the applause and goes on to her next song.

“This next one is a little more upbeat, to make sure you all haven’t gone to sleep on me out there,” she teases, and trails her fingers down the strings in a first chord.

You don’t know this song, but it fits nicely in Clarke’s range and has an infectious sort of flow to it.

And once again, it seems like Clarke can’t look away. You’re blushing now, but it’s so clear that she’s singing to you that you can’t duck away from the scrutiny.

_“Baby we were born with fire and gold in our eyes, fire and gold in our eyes. Got lightning in a bottle, hands on the throttle, even in the dust we shine - with fire and gold in our eyes.”_

As the bridge comes around, Clarke slows her chords and strings them into long chains of cascading notes instead. _“There is love inside this madness, we are walking on the moon.” ___Her eyes are somewhere on the back of the crowd now, and it must be a trick of the lighting, because they look overbright with emotion. _“Though I don’t believe in magic —_ ” a pause in her chords, and her eyes snap so sharply back to yours that you can feel her gaze like a hand on your arm. “ _—I believe in me and you._ ”

You swallow hard and try to ignore Octavia as she taps her ankle against yours and giggles.

“Thank you everyone again for coming,” Clarke says as the song ends. She pauses to take a long swig of water. “This is my last song for the night, and after I’m finished we’ll be taking a ten minute intermission before the second half of the show.” Another drink of water, and she clears her throat, fidgeting with the cap on her water bottle.

“This last song is for a certain person that…may or may not be here tonight in the audience. Anyways. This person means a lot to me. A whole lot. And I’m hoping that she knows how special she is to me, and to everyone really. So.” She smiles a little nervously. “Let’s get on with this.”

Octavia is _very_ insistently nudging you now, and you shoot her a brief glance. “ _What?_ ”

“She’s talking about _you_ , you dork,” Octavia stage-whispers, her eyes alight. “And she's been prepping this for days, so I hope you’re absolutely soaking this up.”

Thankfully you’re spared having to respond when Clarke begins her final song of the evening.

_“For those days we felt like a mistake, for those times when love’s what you hate - somehow, we keep marching on.”_

Clarke meets your eyes, smiling a little shyly through her singing, and you feel yourself smiling back at her as all the heat in your chest swells up so brightly that you feel like you can’t contain it any more.

Because she’s singing your song. For you. And you literally only told her about it two days ago — did she literally learn it just so she could play it to you in front of this small coffeeshop crowd?

_“But with what we have, I promise you that we’re marching on.”_

If that isn’t a declaration of devotion, you don’t know what is.

And in that moment, in the space between the chords of the song that means more to you than any other, you make a decision.

You want to be with Clarke. You’re _ready_ to be with Clarke.

The rest of the song goes by in a sort of haze. Your mind has gone all warm and blurry, and all you can see is Clarke as she takes a final bow and gathers her guitar as the intermission begins.

You’re on the stage before you really even realize you’ve left your chair.

“Lexa!” Clarke says, her hands floating to your shoulders, and her eyes are bright with concern. “Is…was that…?”

You shut her up by kissing her.

Raven and Octavia aren’t the only ones wolf-whistling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise, there's a playlist for this fic! It can be found [here](http://8tracks.com/butterflyklisses/we-wrote-down-another-vision-of-us) and includes all of the songs mentioned in this chapter, as well as some others. A tracklist can be found [here](http://clarkesmech.tumblr.com/post/139983823991/we-wrote-down-another-vision-of-us-link-a) for those of you who are out of country and can't use 8tracks.
> 
> Another surprise! The cover of "Ocean Avenue" that's on the playlist is actually sung by me! My best friend Marc and I are in a little band together we call Asa Spades, and the last time we were together we recorded this puppy. It's one of my favorites.
> 
> Songs mentioned in this chapter:  
> "Breathe" by Alexi Murdoch  
> "Drops of Jupiter" covered by Taylor Swift  
> "I Wanna Get Better" by Against the Current ft. The Ready Set  
> "Ocean Avenue" by Yellowcard  
> "Fire N Gold" by Bea Miller  
> "Marchin' On" by OneRepublic
> 
> As always, I am @clarkesmech on tumblr.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, three months later, I'm back! Thank you so much to all of you that have left comments on the previous chapters -- the fact that this story means so much to people was definitely what brought me back to it.

You smell the bacon cooking before you’re fully awake, and your mind’s eye fills with images of your parents in the kitchen, your mom stirring eggs on the stove and trying not to laugh while your dad flips pancakes in the goofiest ways he can.

But then Raven swears, and Octavia laughs, and you open your eyes to the white concrete walls of your dorm room. You have morning breath, and your lips are chapped, and your dad is still dead.

You close your eyes again, trying to hold onto the tail end of the dream before it fades, but it’s already slipping through your fingers like sand.

Someone knocks on your door then, and you prop yourself up on an elbow as Raven peeks into your room. She’s holding a spatula and is dusted with flour.

“Wake up, sleeping beauty!” She croons. “You’re missing your own celebration breakfast!”

“What are we celebrating?” You mumble, but you’re as awake now as you’re ever going to be, so you slide out of bed.

“We are celebrating Clexa!” Octavia crows from the kitchen. You round the corner, rubbing your eyes.

“Clexa?”

Raven clears her throat. “Clarke,” she says, holding up the spatula. “Lexa,” she adds, grabbing a fork from the counter and brandishing it in her other hand. She brings them together like they’re making out, in a weird kitchen utensil kind of way. “Clexa!”

Oh. _Oh._ Last night comes back to you like a tidal wave - your palms moist on your guitar strings as you squint through the lights to find Lexa, then Lexa hurtling onto the stage and kissing the living breath out of you like she’s been waiting weeks for this.

(You’ve both been waiting for this since before you knew each other, you think.)

“Oh,” you say eloquently, and blush.

‘Celebration breakfast’ is bacon and pancakes, with Octavia arranging fresh blueberries on the pancakes in the shapes of hearts and smiley faces. It’s a cheerful if somewhat embarrassing affair, and by the time you finally check your phone it’s nearly noon.

There’s a text from Lexa, and you excuse yourself to your room to grin in private.

 **Lexa [11:00am]:** Good morning  
**Lexa [11:00am]:** * :-)

There hadn’t been much conversation after the kiss. You had taken Lexa’s hand and dragged her to the wings to kiss her back properly, although your hands were shy and neither of you used tongue, like you were both worried you’d scare the other away.

(What a silly thought, you think now. Lexa would have to try pretty goddamn hard to scare you away now.)

Clearly something is meant to happen now, but social conventions are leaving you at a bit of a loss.

 **Clarke [11:54am]:** Morning! Sorry, roomies were making breakfast :)  
**Lexa [11:55am]:** Nice!  
**Lexa [11:55am]:** Would you perchance still have room for coffee? With me?  
**Clarke [11:56am]:** Hmm…let me think…;)  
**Clarke [11:56am]:** Hehe absolutely. Give me twenty minutes?  
**Lexa [11:57am]:** Sounds good!

—

You get to the coffee shop a few minutes early. Thankfully as an art minor you always have a pen or markers somewhere in your bag, and after snatching a couple of napkins from a nearby table you busy yourself with doodling.

“Am I interrupting?” 

You glance up and shake your head, smiling. Lexa smiles back, then averts her eyes and tucks a strand of hair quickly behind her ear. She slides into the chair across from you.

“What are you drawing?” She asks, and you slide the napkin towards her.

“Have you seen the videos of these guys? Octavia was obsessed with them for months.” The drawing is of a small red panda seated in a patch of grass, hugging his tail to his chest like a security blanket. “If there’s a video of a red panda somewhere on the internet, chances are I have seen it.”

Lexa is smiling again. “I’ve seen a couple. Like the one with the pumpkins.”

“And the one that gets scared?”

“Oh my gosh, yes,” Lexa laughs. “Even Anya cracked a grin at that one.”

The two of you fall into amicable silence, and you see that Lexa’s still smiling. She always seems to be smiling or laughing when the two of you are together, and when she glances up and meets your eyes you feel a little flutter of warmth in your stomach.

“What?” She asks as you grin, and her cheeks flush pink.

“Octavia and Raven made me a celebratory breakfast,” you say instead. “For last night.”

“You deserve it, your set was awesome.” 

“Oh — no.” Now it’s your turn to blush. “For our kiss.”

“Oh.” Lexa’s eyes dart to her lap, but her lips are curling slowly into a very pleased looking smile. “It was a good kiss.”

“Yeah, it was. And I wouldn’t mind doing it again sometime.”

“Me either.”

“Not at all.”

“Nope.”

There are people around, and you don’t want to embarrass Lexa (you think last night’s dramatic display of affection was a rare event for her), so instead of going in for another kiss, you steal back the napkin. You shield it with your free hand as you pluck a pen from behind your ear and scribble a quick addition.

“ _You’re lovely when you’re happy_ ,” you write, and add a little heart at the end before shoving it back towards Lexa. 

Watching her smile is like curling up in a puddle of sunlight — your entire body warms. It’s also fascinating to observe her in public, when you’ve tasted those lips and felt those curls slide between your fingers. It’s like a secret that only the two of you share.

(Well, the two of you and everyone who was at the open mic.)

“So are we going to do this? The…dating thing?” Lexa asks.

You pause. Your heart says yes, your body says _yes_ , but the part of you that Finn took with him is more cautious. Lexa seems to notice your hesitation and keeps talking. “We can take it as slow as you want. We don’t even have to call it ‘dating’ if you don’t want. But,” she bites her lip, “I want to be with you if I can.”

“I want to be with you too,” you say immediately. “But…Lexa, I’m a bucket of crazy, you know that, right?”

Lexa laughs. “Look who you’re talking to. I understand crazy, Clarke. There will have to be boundaries.”

“Absolutely.”

“We aren’t each others’ therapists.”

“But we’re also here for each other,” you put in. “I’m here for you.”

“Me too. But you’ll have to be patient with me, okay?”

“If it takes all the time in the world.” You touch her hand across the table. She laces your fingers together. “As long as you’re patient with me too.”

Lexa brings your twined fingers to her lips and kisses them. “Deal.”

—

 **Lexa [9:56pm]:** You’d tell me if I’m about to make a really dumb decision, right?  
**Clarke [9:58pm]:** just make sure you have a really good place to hide the body  
**Clarke [9:58pm]:** do you need an alibi? cuz I’ve totally got your back.  
**Lexa [9:59pm]:** Ha ha.  
**Lexa [10:00pm]:** No murder, but I appreciate the vote of confidence.  
**Clarke [10:01pm]:** That WAS in my girlfriend contract, right? Being a willing accomplice?  
**Clarke [10:01pm]:** ;) In all srsness. What decision?  
**Lexa [10:05pm]:** I’m thinking of joining a club sports team next semester.  
**Lexa [10:05pm]:** But I suck at sports.  
**Clarke [10:06pm]:** !!!!!!!! That sounds like so much fun!!  
**Clarke [10:06pm]:** You should totally 100% go for it

 **Clarke [10:20pm]:** What sport?  
**Lexa [10:13pm]:** Soccer or volleyball. Probably soccer?  
**Clarke [10:13pm]:** [soccer ball] [soccer ball] [soccer ball] [thumbs-up]  
**Clarke [10:13pm]:** My grad-student-slash-therapist says I should be doing more social activities to keep myself busy, so maybe I’ll have to join something too.

—

You’re taking a break from writing an English essay — your last one before the final, you hope — and emerge from your room to find that Raven and Octavia have company. It’s not a big living room to begin with, but add your roommates, Bellamy, Lincoln, Monty, and Jasper, and you’re having a hard time stepping over legs and laptop cords to get to the kitchen.

“Clarke will want to!” Monty insists. Bellamy rolls his eyes.

“No she won’t. It’s for nerds anyways.”

“What are we talking about?” You grab a yogurt and delicately perch on the arm of the couch. Raven, who’s sitting closest to you, is eyeing your yogurt, so you try to turn your back to her. It only sort of works.

“Dungeons and Dragons,” Jasper says solemnly, and Bellamy snorts derisively. 

“See? Nerds.” He’s clearly expecting you to be in his camp on this one.

“Tell me more,” you say instead, and Monty fist-pumps the air. Raven takes advantage of your distraction to dip her finger into your yogurt. You smack her but give her the rest of it, because she _touched it_ , super gross.

Between Monty and Jasper talking over each other, it takes the better part of an hour to get through the basics. You’re hooked, and you’re not the only one. Octavia is on the edge of her seat - or, rather, Lincoln’s lap - and even Bellamy is beginning to look grudgingly interested.

“So do we want to meet Thursday and start working on our character stats?” Jasper asks.

“I think you’ll have to count me out.” Raven raises her hand. “Research is eating my life.”

“Anyone else? Bellamy?”

Bellamy gives an extended, dramatic sigh. “Fine,” he says. “But if it’s as dorky as you two, I’m not sticking with it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...why no I absolutely did not join a D &D league this summer why do you ask
> 
> Hit me up on tumblr @ clarkesmech with any questions/prompts/personal vendettas/etc.! Additionally, consider checking out some of my other stuff -- I hope to have an update out for my spy fic within the next week, as well as the beginnings of a new Clexa AU :)


End file.
